Author: Mr G

Sign up to WeVideo

Aside

Your third CCR will be edited in WeVideo, which means you can edit from home.

One of your group will need to sign up to WeVideo and join the Media Studies group.

All Film Studies students should already be signed up and members of WeVideo.

Otherwise you will need to sign up in three stages.

  1. Sign Up for a Free WeVideo Account (this should still be active from last year)
    • Please use your school Google to sign up / in.
  2. Follow this invitation link to the school WeVideo Account
  3. Check that you have been invited to the project entitled:
    • Apprentice Vlog 2018

OR YOU CAN EDIT IT ON PREMIERE PRO BUT YOU MIGHT WANT WE VIDEO FOR YOUR CCR4 REFLECTIONS AND YOU CAN ALSO DO THE EDITING AT HOME.

Creative Critical Reflection 1

Standard

How do your products use or challenge conventions and how do they represent social groups or issues?

Task: Prezi (Individual Task)

You should describe and analyse your three products with reference to specific examples and use terminology to describe how those conventional features have been used, developed, challenged (designed) by you to construct/represent a specific set of ideas, which is: your brand or mission statement! 

You must then go on to say how your representation (ideology) of your star and issues raised in video were shaped by you.

  • The conventional design features in your video, include examples such as lighting, framing & composition, camera movement  mise-en-scene, editing styles, filters, effects and rhythmic editing…
  • Conventional print design in your digipack: images, filters, adjustments, graphics, colour palette, typeface, stroke, fill, gradients, arrangement (Bring Forward, Back)…
  • Conventional web design: call to action, hero shot, social media tours, interactivity, merch links…

 

Example Prezi

Select images from professional examples and your own texts. Remember you should be able to compare or contrast the examples.

There should be five examples from your music video and three each for digipack and website.

In the video you should consider…

  • images that shows a link between themes in the music and how they are amplified / illustrated in the narrative
  • generically (un)conventional star image
  • images that demonstrates conventional use of camera
  • images that demonstrates conventional use of lighting / colour
  • images that demonstrates (un)conventional mise-en-scene
  • images that show an (un)conventional use of narrative
  • images that show you’ve drawn  inspiration from other music videos & media texts
  • FORMS (technical conventions) of lip syncing, editing to the beat, repeatability, narrative/performance ratio/ type of narrative

In the digipack you should consider…

  • how do the images scheme reflect the genre of music?
    • conventions of photo composition
    • filters / images adjustment
    • colour scheme
    • design of mise-en-scene / art work
  • how is the layout / DTP conventional for digipacks and adverts?
    • typeface selection & size
    • graphics
    • typeface size and selection
    • spacing
    • relationship between image and copy
    • FORMS (technical conventions) i.e. tracks, publisher, copy, album name, performer name, image, advert image from DP.

In the website you should consider…

  • Pages
  • Content (videos, music, album art, merchandise…)
  • Social media links
  • Design & brand
  • Fonts & colours
  • Backgrounds
  • Images

 Examples from previous students:

SASHA BELFORD

HOLLY BROWN

TERMS

Some of the concept / micro terms you should include…remember to use the terms related to Genre:

…conventional, generic, typical, usual, frequent, unusual, subvert, unconventional, challenged, used, applied, developed, manipulated, exaggerated, amplified, increased, augmented,  + repertoire of elements, genre, blueprint, contract, ingredients, star image, audience expectations, paradox of the star, ordinary, extraordinary, semic codes, cultural codes, symbolic codes, mise-en-scene, camera, lighting, font, integration of copy and images, shot distances, composition, editing, camera movement, narrative structure, disjunctive/amplified narratives, character types…

You should also regularly use ‘analysis words’ such as: represents, implies, suggests, connotes, reflects, signifies, emphasises, highlights, underlines, illustrates, shows, contributes to.

And always explain how your have…applied, developed, challenged convention. Also synonyms such as extend, subvert, amplify, exaggerate, increase, improve, extend, copy, contrast, contradict are useful alternatives.  MAKE SURE YOU HIGHLIGHT THESE KEY TERMS/WORDS AND THEN YOU KNOW YOU HAVE ADDRESSED THE QUESTION.

Skills – The story so far

Standard

This was you before you started Media Studies….

This is you now…

How did you achieve such skills?

OK SO RECAP…FLASHBACK to S1E1…

A long time ago Mrs Cobb and Mr Gregson asked some students to keep a diary of reflections…

You know, those random reflection posts that your past selves wrote as you made your preliminary tasks, your music magazines, your music videos, your digipacks and your websites…

  • Also, just as important are your Creative Critical Reflection questions.

You have been reflecting, logging and recording your skills development from the beginning of the course and ALL THE ANSWERS TO THIS ARE IN YOUR BLOG!

So…you need to go back through time, back through your blog & maybe ours, to find the answers to these questions:

  • How did you get so creative?
  • To what extent did the development of your research and planning lead to more creative
    media products?
  • In what ways did you engage with the conventions of real media texts in your own productions?
  • Assess the importance of digital technology skills in your production work.

Spot the fake previous exam question above…however,

CREATIVITY really is at the heart of it all!

Media Studies is, after all, a creative art.

It fact, I would argue that Media is The Creative Art that is shaping the images, the sounds, the links, the narratives, the genres, the representations and ultimately the ideas that shape society’s values, attitudes and beliefs…

YEAH BABY! IDEOLOGY!

That word, ‘Ideology’ is key to understanding Media Studies as a subject!

So go on…explain…what I mean…if you can…

 

Copyright Infomation

Aside

Copyright Info

© & Ⓟ Your name/band name, year. All rights of the produced and of the owner of the work reproduced reserved. Unauthorized copying, hiring, lending, public performance and broadcasting of this recording prohibited.

Your Media Exams

Standard

Your Exams

Component 2 – Key Media Concepts (Exam)

  • Textual analysis of an unseen TV Drama Sequence (50%)
  • Essay on the Music Industry (50%)

Component 4 – Critical Perspectives in Media (Exam)

  • Evaluate your media production skills development
  • Analyse your own media products using key concepts.
  • Explore postmodern media.

“Hang on we haven’t finished, or indeed started, the evaluation questions yet! Just forget the exam for now Mr G & Mrs C,” I hear you implore!

“Ah ha!” we reply. “We had a plan all along!”

We have chosen all the briefs you have done this year to focus you on the music industry. Which is the topic in the second half of question 2 in Component 2 (Key Media Concepts).

Furthermore, we have already taught you everything you need to know to complete the first half of the final media exam, also known as Component 4 (Critical Perspectives). 

So, when you are doing the Critical Creative Reflections you are also preparing for your exam! To prepare you for all this, throughout Year 12 & 13, we made you complete blog posts on:

  • Media Language
  • Representation / Star Image
  • Genre
  • Audience
  • Narrative

…because, these concepts all appear in the exams!

We have made you do a range of  tasks geared to help you understand and learn about media skills:

  •  use of digital technology
    •    creativity
    •    research and planning
    •    using conventions from real media texts.

All of these are skills that will come up in the exam

50% of Component 4 is about your ability to tell stories about your skill development and analyse your own production work as if it were a professional text!

‘Wax on, Wax off. Daniel-son’

…and when Mr Miaki says, “Look eye! Always look I.” He means, “IDEOLOGY” – YEAH BABY!

Coz that’s what Media Studies is about!

Go on, explain if you can…

Create a Sitemap

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This is an essential web site planning task.

TASK: Create a sitemap for your band / artist website.

  • You should do this as a group.

Follow the conventional features of websites you have researched, analysed and evaluated in previous tasks.

Here is an example sitemap, which I created using Creately.com.  However I did find it a little tricky to add pages, so…you could just  draw your version by hand or use shapes & connecting lines in Google Slides.

Your site map should include:

  1. A home or splash page
  2. The main pages
  3. A list of content on each page.

 

Exploring Band Web Sites

Standard

Understand the Media Form (Band Websites)

  • What are the conventional pages & typical information on a music / band website?

User Experience

  • Can the user find what they need / expect?
  • How many clicks away from the home or splash page is the information and content?
  • What is the call to action and how is that promoted on the site?
  • What tools / experiences does the site offer?

Analyse the Design

  • How does the design of the site reflect the brand image?
  • How does the digipack and video design reflect in the website?
  • Does the design and layout of the website suit the target audience?
  • Is the design consistent across the pages?

Professional Examples

TASK

Create a Screencastify which explains, discusses and analyses one of the professional websites above.

Your voice over should cover:

  • Navigation of the website
  • The links to social media
  • The content in the website
  • The call to action and how that is evident in the site
  • The design of the website in relation to their other media (video and digipack)
  • How does it address AIDA – basic design principles of attraction, interest, desire and action?
  • It should include the appropriate terminology for website conventions and forms.

Here is an example analysis from Mr G. Does he cover everything?

A Golden Opportunity

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A not to be missed opportunity is coming to Guernsey. As creative arts students you should try and cultivate an interest and engage with all the visual arts and also try and network and build up your contacts. You should go to this…

Click for Info

Your Album Brand & Mission Statement

Standard

Remember the brief?

A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music video (major task), together with a website for the band and a digipak for the album’s release (minor tasks).

It is important to note from the beginning that you are not making a digipack and website to advertise your music video! You are launching a new album, which contains that song, but which also contains a number of other tracks.

So before you start planning the print and web elements of this promotional package. You need to be clear about the mission statement for the whole campaign. You must think more holistically about the album and create an integrated advertising campaign…

Your Marketing Strategy & Mission Statement

Who is your Audience?

  • Who they are (demographics)
  • What other media they consume and participate in.
  • What their values attitudes and beliefs (ideology / psychographics)

A Call to Action

  • How do you want the audience to engage with your star / album
  • How will they invest time and money in your star / album

Who are the competition?

  • Name three similar bands / artists.
  • What are the trends in album designs of similar stars / bands?
  • What does their website look like?

Your USP (Unique Selling Point)

  • Is your star already established or are trying to establish a new presence in the market?
  • What is your star image & how are you trying to innovate / develop that image?
    • Are you mixing up elements of different genres?
    • Are you trying to re-brand your star?
    • Are you emphasising the ordinary or extraordinary?
      • Remember according to Dyer meta narratives include both.

Your Mission Statement.

  • In 50 words or fewer write an agreed mission statement that includes the central idead that will unify your brand.
    • This will include ideas represented in your music video, but must also bring in a wider range of ideas that you will develop as you make your 3D Moodboard.

TASK.

Complete this mission statement in production groups and copy it into your blog.

This blog post is essential for when you come to complete Creative Critical Reflection 2.

How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of ‘branding’?

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